


Space/Time Redux: Narcissus

by Caides



Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who & Related Fandoms, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Anal Play, Character Analysis, F/F, Lesbian Sex, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-30
Updated: 2014-11-30
Packaged: 2018-02-27 11:44:43
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 14,480
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2691713
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Caides/pseuds/Caides
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>An adaptation and continuation of the Comic Relief minisodes 'Space' and 'Time' by Steven Moffat.</p><p>"This is where it all ends; Pond flirting with herself. True love at last."</p><p>Gets a bit dark towards the end.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Space/Time

Amy watched him intently.

  
She'd been putting it off for too long; she had to talk to him _now_ . She took a deep breath and edged closer to the console, beneath which the Doctor lay on his back on his little wheeled trolley, tinkering about with the TARDIS. He whistled away to himself as he fumbled about with a long piece of cable, which he then reconnected to the underside of the console. As he reached up with his right hand and felt his way around the controls, searching for a specific one, she steeled herself to approach.  
  
“Hey you,” she said playfully.  
  
For a moment, he wheeled himself out from under the console to greet her, supporting himself with both hands on the console. “Hey!” he said cheerfully, then as quickly as he had appeared he retracted back underneath the controls of his beloved ship. The image reminded Amy of a typical bloke tinkering about with his motor. In other, less serious circumstances, she would have chuckled.  
  
She watched him for a moment, mulling over the possibility that he was being wilfully oblivious to the obvious — or so she thought — fact that she needed to talk. No matter how close she got to him — that is, as close as the Doctor let _anyone_ get to him — she would never be able to compete with the other woman in his life; the TARDIS. Not wishing to spend the next few minutes struggling to get his attention, she decided to try the direct approach. Bending down to reach him, she placed a hand on his right shoulder and pulled him out from his hiding place. He looked a little surprised at being dragged from one of his favourite pastimes, and vaguely scared as he registered the perturbed look on her face.  
  
“Listen,” she said, “can we talk?”  
  
The Doctor's eyes widened in fear. “RORYYYYYYYY!!!” He screamed without warning, perhaps remembering the last time she had expressed a desire to “talk.” Or rather... something else that involved using her lips — “talk” hadn't exactly been on the agenda.  
  
 _That_ wasn't her intention this time.  
  
She rolled her eyes as he wheeled himself back under the console, the wheels squeaking as he did so. She grabbed him, this time with both hands, and pulled him back once again. “No. Shut up, I've just got a question, that's all.”  
  
“You OK up there?” came a voice from below the console, which Amy recognised immediately as being that of her husband. She was a little surprised to hear it, for she had assumed that he was elsewhere in the ship rather than apparently helping the Doctor with his repairs, or upgrades, or whatever it was her boys were doing. She stood up straight and peered through the glass floor to where Rory, wearing the Doctor's comedy goggles and holding what appeared to be a large wrench of some kind, was fiddling about with various components of the ship. “Yeah, fine, no problem,” the Doctor called out in reply.  
  
“What are you doing?” she demanded of Rory, placing her hands on her hips. Once again, the Doctor disappeared under the console.  
  
“Helping the Doctor,” Rory replied. “Um... it's humming,” he continued, this time to the Doctor, “is that OK?”  
  
“Yeah,” the Doctor answered, popping out again. “It's fine, we're just entering conceptual space. Imagine a banana, or anything curved... actually, don't 'cause it's not curved, or like a banana. Forget the banana.”  
  
Amy rolled her eyes once again, shaking her head in disbelief. For such an intelligent being, he wasn't half scatter-brained, and what's more, he had enlisted _Rory_ as his little apprentice. “Um, is he helping you _fly the TARDIS_ ?” she demanded.  
  
Rather than answer her question directly, he addressed Rory. “Um, attach thermo-couplings 2, 7 and 11, like I showed you.” As he spoke, he got to his feet and gazed down at Rory, addressing him as if he were talking to a child. Clearly whatever Rory was doing was extremely important.  
  
Amy felt a little put-out. “How come he gets a go? You _never_ let _me_ have a go?” she moaned.  
  
The Doctor looked at her, clearly struggling to come up with an answer that wouldn't earn him a light slap in the face. Mercifully, Rory did the job for him. “Uh, Doctor, _don't_ ,” he called. “Seriously, I let her drive my car once...”  
  
Oh God, he was bringing _that_ up. “Yeah, to the end of the road,” she scoffed.  
  
“Yeah,” Rory countered, “where, according to Amy, there was an 'unexpected house'...”  
  
She shot him one of _those_ looks. “Aw, he's jealous because _I_ passed my test first time.”  
  
“You cheated,” he shot back, “you wore a skirt.”  
  
“I didn't wear a skirt.”  
  
“Well, that would've worked too...” Rory considered.  
  
Amy chose to ignore the Doctor pottering about around the console and sneaking a glance at the miniskirt she was nearly wearing — her favourite one that drove all the guys crazy — and quickly looking away like a naughty schoolboy, probably wondering whether she had caught him looking. He'd had his chance.  
  
She suddenly realised that actually, Rory was right. “No, no, I _did_ wear a skirt,” she corrected herself, “but it was any old skirt.”  
  
“You ever seen Amy drive, Doctor?” Rory called out.  
  
“No,” the Time Lord called back curtly – apparently, and mercifully, forgetting their experience in the Dream Lord's Psychic Pollen-induced hallucination. At least in that instance she had been _aiming_ for the house.  
  
“Neither did her driving examiner...” Rory added cheekily.  
  
“Actually... it was _th_ _is_ one,” Amy realised, pointing to her skirt. “It was _this_ skirt.”  
  
Suddenly, there was a loud clang, and the ship was rocked by an almighty tremor that almost forced the trio off their feet. Reflexively, the Doctor and Amy grabbed hold of the console and held on tightly. The entire console room was bathed in a strange, eerie green glow.  
  
Amy held her breath, afraid to exhale. The Doctor looked around for a moment, obviously as uneasy as she was. She hated that. The pair exchanged looks. “What was that?” she asked, her voice no more than a whisper.  
  
The Doctor's expression was one of intense fear, which was scary in itself. “Rory!” he cried, “did you drop a themo-coupling?!”  
  
A moment passed, which seemed to stretch on for ages, before Rory answered. “S...Sorry,” he stuttered awkwardly.  
  
“Aaagh! How did you do that?!” the Doctor cried in dismay. “I _told_ you, don't drop them! I specifically mentioned _not_ dropping!”  
  
 _Uh, oh_ , Amy thought. She knew exactly why Rory had dropped the coupling. “I-It was my fault,” she stammered.  
  
The Doctor looked at her with an expression of puzzlement, then began working the console frantically, wondering why she was trying to cover for Rory. “Of course it wasn't your fault.”  
  
“It kind of _was_ her fault,” Rory said.  
  
“How could it be _her_ fault?!” the Doctor cried exasperatedly.  
  
Amy replied without missing a beat. “Because it was my skirt, and my husband, and your glass floor...” She looked at the Time Lord with a sheepish look of apology.  
  
It took a brief second for him to process what she was saying, then he looked down, his eyes passing from her skirt to the floor. Then, his face crumpled in disgust. “Ohhhh, _Rory_ !!!”  
  
“Sorry,” was all the young man could say.  
  
“Well, we've landed,” the Doctor stated, wasting no more time. He pulled levers and flicked switches on the console. “Emergency materialisation. We should be fine, we should've locked on to the safest space available.” He pulled a lever, and the room was suddenly flooded with light once again.  
  
Out of the corner of her eye — that place she never wanted to look — Amy caught sight of something illuminated by the orange glow of the lights. Something that had inexplicably appeared in the control room near the doors. Something _big_ . The Doctor and Rory saw it too, and as one the trio looked towards the foreign object that had caught their attention. A chill passed down Amy's spine as she recognised the very familiar sight. A sight that most definitely should _not_ have been _here_ .  
  
 _But that's_ ... her mind struggled for an adjective that would adequately describe what they were seeing, and eventually settled on, _impossible_ ...  
  
She stared, bewildered and open-mouthed. Similarly, the Doctor and Rory expressed their shock and surprise, the Doctor stroking his chin and Rory gazing with wide-eyed wonder.  
  
 _This... can't be_ , the Doctor thought.  
  
Before them, standing in the middle of the lower level of the console room, was a Metropolitan Police Public Call Box from 1963.  
  
The TARDIS.  
  
 _I_ _nside_ the TARDIS. _What_ was going on?! “Doctor...” Amy began, faltering, “what's happened?”  
  
The Doctor looked at the box intently as, slowly, the travellers moved towards it in shock. “Safest spot available,” he said, not averting his gaze from the other TARDIS. “The TARDIS has materialised inside itself.” He moved down the steps to the lower level and made his way toward it while his companions remained on the upper level, staring intently.  
  
“Is that... supposed to happen?” Rory asked, although he suspected he already knew the answer.  
  
“Take a guess,” the Doctor replied.  
  
“No?” Rory tried, somewhat needlessly.  
  
“That's the one.” The Doctor reached the box, and placed his hand against the door sign, feeling the familiar faint vibration.  
  
“Woah, what are you doing?” Amy asked, worriedly. Perhaps this wasn't the TARDIS? What if it was some kind of alien trick?  
  
The Doctor, as was often the case, seemed very unsure of himself. “I've absolutely no idea,” he replied before suddenly, in a burst of energy, opening the door and moving inside the box.  
  
Instantaneously, _another_ Doctor appeared, entering the TARDIS through the main double doors from outside and slamming it behind him. _No_ , Amy realised, _not_ another _Doctor_ , the _Doctor_ . He was right; the TARDIS was inside itself... somehow. He had stepped into the Police Box here inside the TARDIS, and arrived inside the TARDIS, which was here inside the TARDIS. Her head hurt.  
  
“OK,” she said. “That is a _bit_ weird...”  
  
The Doctor opened the door again and reached outside. At the same time, the door of the box inside the control room opened also, and the Doctor's tweed-clad arm extended out of it, wiggling his fingers.  
  
Rory chuckled in amazement. “That is actually pretty cool,” he said.  
  
The Doctor's arm retracted into the box. “Oh, I'm glad you're _entertained_ , Rory, now that we're stuck here for all eternity. At least you won't be _bored_ .”  
  
Amy didn't like the sound of that one bit. “Wait, what? We're _stuck_?”  
  
“The inside of the TARDIS is now joined to the outside of the TARDIS. Worse than a time loop; a space loop.” He paused, seemingly for dramatic effect. “Nothing can enter or leave this ship ever again.”  
  
Before Amy and Rory had a chance to absorb this information, the door of the control room — the one they were standing in — opened, and someone entered the TARDIS.  
  
The Doctor wheeled around on his heels to regard the new arrival, as Amy's heart almost leapt out of her mouth. It wasn't just someone, it was _her_.  
  
Amy Pond.  
  
Another TARDIS, another Amy.  
  
The second Amy strode confidently and purposefully towards the trio before coming to a halt and addressing them. “OK kids,” she said, “ _this_ is where it gets complicated...”  
  
Amy — the Amy indigenous to the present time-frame — stared incredulously at her doppelgänger, unwilling or unable to believe that this woman was in fact her. “Who the _hell_ are you?” she found herself asking, her voice seeming to come from far away.  
  
“I'm you, from your future,” answered her double, her tone carrying an undercurrent of, _Isn't_ that _interesting?!_  
  
The Doctor took a step towards her. “Tell me exactly what's happened,” he commanded.  
  
“Well,” the second Amy replied, “the exterior shell of the TARDIS has drifted forwards in time. If you step into the box now you step inside the control room a tiny bit into the past.” She smiled, looking pleased with herself.  
  
Amy's eyes glazed over as she stared at her future self. “I... don't understand,” she said.  
  
Her other self peered past the Doctor at her. “Neither do I,” she admitted, conspiratorially.  
  
“But you just _sai_ _d_ it,” Amy challenged.  
  
“No, I just repeated it,” the second Amy replied. “I'm just remembering what I heard myself saying when I was standing where you are now and repeating it. I'm just repeating this too. And this,” she said, then added, “ _And_ this... ”  
  
Her younger self shook her head. “I still don't understand.”  
  
The future Amy rolled her eyes. “You _still_ don't,” she said wearily.  
  
The Doctor, who had been looking back and forth between them throughout the preceding conversation as if he were watching a tennis match, spoke up, addressing the Amy from the future. “OK, when does this Amy” — he indicated _his_ Amy Pond — “step inside the box? We need to maintain the timeline.”  
  
“Ah, as soon as she slapped Rory,” the second Amy replied.  
  
“OK,” the present Amy said, unflinching.  
  
Rory had been staring, baffled, befuddled and bewildered while his wife conversed with another version of herself, wondering how and why his life had taken such a bizarre turn for the fantastical of late. Now, he was shaken out of his reverie. “Huh?!” he turned to the Amy standing next to him, and then back at the other version of her. “No. Why do I get slapped?”  
  
“Because we have to stick to the established chain of events,” the Doctor replied. “One mistake and the whole timeline could collapse. We'll end up with two Amy Ponds forever, and _then_ what would you do?!” He turned to face Rory.  
  
Rory thought for a moment and, realising that having two Amies around wouldn't _entirely_ be a bad thing, he opened his mouth to speak. Reading his dirty mind, Amy — _his_ Amy, if the distinction even mattered — let out a shocked vocalised gasp, and slapped him across the face.  
  
“OK, you, into the Police Box now,” the Doctor ordered her.  
  
As Rory nursed his sore cheek, Amy sprinted down the steps to the box. When she reached it, she turned back to the Doctor. “And then _I_ become _her_ ?” she asked, indicating her other self.  
  
“Yes. Go, go, go!” the Doctor replied frantically.  
  
Amy looked herself in the eye. It was different from looking in the mirror, somehow. Usually, she only ever saw herself as a reflected image or in photos, but this wasn't the same. She was looking at herself in the flesh. For the first time, she truly saw herself the way others saw her, and she had to admit, she really _liked_ what she saw.  
  
Her eyes darted up and down her own body admiringly. What's more, she knew that her other self knew what she was thinking. “Do I really look like that?” she asked.  
  
Her future self gave her a faint smile, somewhere between vainglory and lust. “Yeah. Yeah, you do.”  
  
A lascivious smirk beginning to play across her lips, Amy gave her other self the once-over again. “Ooh,” she said, “I'd give you your driving licence...”  
  
“I _bet_ you would,” her other self replied with her best flirtatious pout, the one usually reserved for her husband. Or the Doctor. Or whomever else took her fancy, if she were truly honest with herself.  
  
The Doctor let out a long, vocal sigh. “This is how it all ends,” he said, his voice weary. “Pond flirting with herself. True love at last.” Then, remembering Amy's husband standing beside him, he added; “Oh... sorry Rory,” and looked away sheepishly.  
  
“Absolutely no problem at all, mate...” came the dreamy reply. Mr. Pond's mind was obviously far away, and the Doctor knew exactly where it was.  
  
“ _Now_ , Amy!” the Doctor said firmly, changing the subject and emphasising the importance of getting into the box.  
  
Amy turned back to her future self. “What's my first line?”  
  
“'OK kids, this is where it gets complicated',” the future Amy reminded, echoing the words she had spoken to her seven-year-old self upon being released from the Pandorica in the National Museum.  
  
“Gotcha!” her past self beamed, then she gave herself one final, quick flirtatious glance before disappearing into the Police Box and closing the door behind her.  
  
With her other self now a few minutes in the past, the “future” Amy was now aligned with this timeline. They had effectively swapped places. “So, is that it?” Amy asked, quickly moving away from the box to join the Doctor and Rory on the upper level. “Are we OK now?”  
  
“No,” the Doctor replied gravely. “We're still trapped.”  
  
Startled by the sound of the door opening once again, Amy spun around on her heels to see herself re-enter the control room, this time with Rory in tow. _Another_ Rory.  
  
“What are you doing?!” the Doctor demanded of them.  
  
“You told us to get into the Police Box,” the second Rory replied “Well, from your point-of-view you're about to tell us to get into the Police Box, from our point-of-view you just told us to get into the Police Box, which is why we got into the Police Box, which is why we're...” he looked around, “here.”  
  
The Rory who belonged to the Doctor and Amy's timeline blinked in frustration, confusion and disbelief. “Do I have to remember all of that?”  
  
“It just sort of happens...” his future self realised.  
  
The two Amies once again stood eyeing up each other lustfully, Amy Pond's narcissism knowing no bounds.  
  
“Hi!” said the Amy who was standing with the Doctor and Rory, her voice breathy. She gave herself a flirty little wave, which Rory recognised as the kind she would often give him from a distance when they first started dating.  
  
“Hi!” her slightly older self beamed, blushing and returning the wave.  
  
“Hey! Stop that!” the Doctor said, and pushed his Amy and Rory toward the other TARDIS. “You two, into the Police Box _now_ . Run!”  
  
Without argument, they ran to the box and pushed their way through the right-hand door, leaving the other Amy and Rory to take their place in the timeline they had left.  
  
“So, what now?” Amy asked as she and Rory moved toward the Doctor.  
  
“You two!” the Doctor cried, holding up his hand to stop them. “Stay where you are!” He then began to operate the control console, frantically and with purpose.  
  
“What are you doing?” Rory asked.  
  
“I'm setting up a controlled temporal implosion,” he replied. “It's the only way to reset the TARDIS, but unless I find exactly the right lever to control the implosion,” he paused and looked directly at them, “we're all gonna die...”  
  
“You _don't know_ which lever?” Amy said, darkly and with worry. Somehow though, she wasn't surprised.  
  
A thin smile spread across the old man's young face. “No,” he replied, “but I'm about to find out.”  
  
Just then, the TARDIS door opened once again, making Amy jump, and this time it was another Doctor who entered. Stepping between Amy and Rory, he addressed his other self; “The wibbley lever!”  
  
“The wibbley lever! Thank you,” the present Doctor replied, emphasising it with a hand gesture. He rushed back to the console, pulled the so-called “wibbley lever” – actually the relative drift compensator – and ran as fast as he could to the Police Box, slamming the door behind him. The box began to dematerialise with the familiar otherworldly wheezing, groaning sound. A strong wind blew up as the dematerialisation disturbed the air molecules around it. Finally, the other TARDIS disappeared completely, the distinctive sound of its ancient engines echoing away into the distance, leaving the Doctor, Amy and Rory to breathe a sigh of relief.  
  
“OK, we're back in normal flight,” the Doctor said, moving between his friends and putting his arms around their shoulders. “The TARDIS is no longer inside itself, the localised time field is no longer about to implode and rip a hole in all causality but just in case...” he glanced down at Amy's skirt. “Pond, put some trousers on.”  
  
With that, he bounded back up to the console level, leaving behind a very embarrassed Amy, who rolled her eyes with a smile, heat rising in her cheeks. She caught Rory giving her an awkward glance. “ _What_ ?” she mouthed. He raised his eyebrows, and went to join the Doctor. A mischievous smile spread across Amy's features, and she moved towards the console, where the Doctor was fiddling about with the controls.  
  
“Well, that was... an experience...” Amy commented wryly.  
  
“Doctor,” Rory began as he approached the Time Lord, “there's just one thing I'm still not getting.”  
  
“Hmm?” he replied. “What's that?”  
  
“Well, Amy came back in time a few minutes and told us what was happening... but who told Amy?”  
  
“ _She_ did,” the Doctor answered immediately.  
  
“Yeah...” Rory said, “but how did she know what to say?”  
  
That was a question that Amy had wanted to know the answer to as well. “Yeah,” she added, “where did that information _come from_? I didn't know what I was talking about!”

The Doctor sighed. “Well, you see, it's like this; as time isn't a strict progression of cause to effect, the seemingly logical rules of causality don't always apply.” He sat down in the pilot's chair and crossed his legs. “Imagine if you went back in time and gave Shakespeare a copy of his complete works so that Shakespeare simply copies them out.” He smiled to himself. “Actually _I_ copied them out for him, he sprained his wrist writing sonnets... but, I digress. The plays would then exist for you to take back in time and give to Will, which begs the question; who actually _created_ those plays in the first place?” He paused for just a moment, allowing them to ponder the question. “Well... no-one,” he continued. “You got them from Shakespeare, and Shakespeare got them from you. That's just how it works. It's called an Ontological Paradox — like, Rory, when you rescued me from the Pandorica. Usually that kind of thing would destroy two-thirds of the universe, but as in that case there was less than two-thirds of the universe _left_ , it didn't really seem to matter.”

Rory shook his head. “I'm still not getting it.” He understood the principle, but not the logic.  
  
The Doctor ran a hand through his unruly mop of hair. “Sometimes, effect leads to cause leads to effect. Don't try to understand it, you'll give yourself a nosebleed.”  
  
Amy snickered. As the Doctor clapped his hands, leapt to his feet and pirouetted around the console, she had to smile at his awkward, gangly physicality, like he was constantly about to burst out of his own skin.  
  
As she watched the Time Lord, Rory turned to her. “It wasn't your fault, you know.”

Amy looked at him, a quizzical expression on her face.

“The skirt,” he clarified. “What happened. I shouldn't have... I mean, you can wear what the hell you like.”

She shrugged; he was right, she supposed. Actually... he _was_ right. “Yeah! You know what; that was _your_ fault. Grow up and get a grip!” Her tongue was firmly in her cheek, and her her eyes glistened with good humour.

Rory's cheeks brightened, and he looked at the floor, like a child who'd been caught sneaking a look at something he definitely shouldn't have been looking at.

Amy chuckled. “It's OK,” she assured him. “I can't help it if I'm just so darn hot.”

Something about the way she emphasised the final 't' in 'hot' made Rory weak at the knees. He leaned in close to her. “So, uh...” he began, awkwardly, his voice low apparently so that the Doctor wouldn't hear, “would you really... you know...?”

Amy looked at him blankly. “What?” she asked.  
  
“You know...” Rory restated, trying to communicate exactly what he was trying to say with simple facial gestures, such as widening his eyes and nodding suggestively at her, his eyes darting up and down her body. “With yourself?”  
  
Catching on, Amy considered how amusing his reaction to the possibility of having two of her had been, now that she was over the initial shock.  
  
She decided to have some fun.  
  
“Would you like that?” she asked.  
  
He gulped.  
  
Amy pouted in amusement at his little puppy-dog face, seemingly incapable of forming words. _Aww_ ... she thought.  
  
“Um... yes. Yes... I'd... like that,” he stammered, unsure how she would take it. “So... would you?”  
  
She made a show of thinking deeply for a moment, raising her eyes and drumming her fingers against her chin. “Well...” she began, “I suppose it —”  
  
Before she could continue, the TARDIS was rocked by an almighty quake, and its occupants struggled to maintain their balance.  
  
Then, there was an eerie silence. “What was that?” Rory whispered.  
  
 _What now?_ Amy wondered. She recognised the Doctor's expression as the one he wore when he wanted to allay someone's fears but couldn't quite mask his own; what Amy had come to think of as his, 'Everything's gonna be fine' face. “Oh... nothing,” he said.  
  
“Doctor...” Amy said in a wary tone.  
  
Before the Doctor could reply, the proximity alarm sounded, followed by the haunting Cloister Bell, as the ship began to shake once again. The entire room appeared to distort as if one were looking at it through a kaleidoscope.  
  
“Doctor!” Amy cried out. “What is it!?”  
  
The Doctor _knew_ . He'd felt it before. He struggled to reach the console. “Temporal collision!” he cried. “The TARDIS is colliding with...”  
  
He was interrupted by another quake, but Amy had heard enough. “Colliding with _what_?!”  
  
The Doctor worked the console frantically, trying to realign the dimensional stabilisers. “The TARDIS!”  
  
He wasn't making sense. “What?!” Amy and Rory chorused as Rory struggled to get to his feet.  
  
“Hold on!” The Doctor commanded as the ship was rocked again by some unseen force, causing them to grab hold of whatever they could to stay upright.  
  
“It wasn't me this time!” Rory cried out. If he could have afforded to let go of the console without falling over, he would have held up his hands in protest.  
  
“Hold on, _what_ ?” Amy called over the cacophony. “Now we're gonna _collide_ with ourselves?!” Then, with a hint of a mischievous smile, she added; “Am I going to meet myself again?”  
  
The Doctor rolled his eyes, before he and his companions were thrown to the floor by another quake. After a few moments, the shaking subsided, and the TARDIS seemed to stabilise.  
  
Rory picked himself up as the Doctor mentally checked himself over. “Everyone OK?” he asked, worriedly. “Amy?”  
  
“Yeah,” came the groggy reply as Amy slowly picked herself up off the floor.  
  
“Rory?”  
  
“Yeah, Doctor, I'm fine.”  
  
“Good. Amy?”  
  
“Yeah, I'm good, thanks!” came an upbeat reply as Amy sat herself down in the pilot's chair by the console.  
  
“Good,” the Doctor said. “Now, let's...” His words trailed off and he stopped in his tracks. Slowly, he turned around, his expression a mixture of worry and confusion as his eyes darted back and forth from the Amy Pond who had spoken last, sitting grinning at him, and the Amy Pond who was standing on the other side of the console, her mouth agape as she stared intently at her doppelgänger.  
  
“Doctor...” the standing Amy began, her trembling voice betraying her fearful incredulity.  
  
“Woah...” Rory began as he stumbled to join _his_ Amy. “B-But that's...” he stammered, “ _impossible_ ! How's that possible? We're back in normal space, right? Doctor, how come there are two Amies again?”  
  
The Doctor drew breath to speak, then shook his head in disbelief. He allowed a small smile to play across his face. “Temporal collision,” he said, voicing his thoughts. “Amy?” He addressed the Amy who was sitting confidently in the pilot's chair. In any case, the other one was too busy staring at herself to take any notice of him.  
  
“Yep,” the new arrival replied. The Doctor nodded in understanding.  
  
“Um, Doctor...” said _his_ Amy, who looked pale and as if she might faint in shock, “what the _hell_ is going on _now_ ?!”  
  
“We collided with ourselves,” he explained, “at a different point along our time-stream. The shields were down... sorry.” He gave them a sheepish look of apology as Rory rolled his eyes. “The TARDIS has merged with itself in the future,” he continued. “But, why are you here alone, Amy? Why only _you_ ?” _Why now, right after what just happened?_ he wondered.  
  
“OK,” the new Amy said, “deep breath. Three days from now, you're going to collide with your past selves — that's you now, obviously — and this is what happens. Only, the two TARDISes only _h_ _alf_ merge, and I was in the half of the control room that merged. Doctor, Rory, you two are still on _my_ TARDIS.”  
  
Rory shook his head. “Hold on,” he said, trying to wrap his head around the notion. “So this isn't the same as what just happened?”  
  
“Of course,” the Doctor said, ignoring Rory's question. “We haven't merged completely, we've just... dented bumpers.”  
  
“Exactly,” said the future Amy.  
  
“So...” her younger self said, “you're me again... only this time from three days in the future?”  
  
“That's right. This is where it gets _really_ complicated.” She winked at herself.  
  
“And because we haven't merged completely with the other TARDIS,” the Doctor explained, “we should be safe from any repercussions. No black holes or supernovae necessary.” Ignoring Rory and the Amies' confused looks, he continued; “So, we just have to wait it out until the TARDISes separate. Amy... um, _future_ Amy, how long are you here?”  
  
“About an hour,” Amy's future self replied.  
  
The Doctor clapped his hands together. “Well, that's fine then!” he beamed. “Amy can get to know herself better and we can all sit down and have a cup of tea and a nice chat. We can have biscuits. Rory, get the Jammy Dodgers.”  
  
“Wait,” Rory began, “how do we tell them apart?”  
  
The Doctor and his two wives looked at him with expressions that bordered on pity.  
  
“Um... they're wearing different _clothes_ ,” the Doctor pointed out helpfully.  
  
“Ah,” Rory replied sheepishly. “Pretend I didn't say that.”  
  
“Besides,” the Doctor added, “it's not like they're trying to keep secret from us which one's which. She's not an alien duplicate out to kill us all...” he indicated the new arrival before his smile faded, his mind wandering to the possibility, and he looked at her intently. “You're _not_ , are you?”  
  
“No!” future Amy replied indignantly.  
  
“Prove it,” the present Amy demanded, a note of scepticism in her voice, “Who am I?” Despite having only just met herself a few minutes ago, something about this didn't feel right. Encountering her future self _twice_ in two separate incidents in the space of a few minutes? It felt like far too big a coincidence.  
  
Her future self smiled, and walked towards her, invading her personal space. The woman certainly _smelled_ like her — she recognised her own perfume. “Amelia Jessica Pond,” she began, “born in Inverness on the twenty-fourth of July 1989 to Tabetha and Augustus Pond. Moved to Leadworth when we were six. We'd go back for holidays in Drumnadrochit every year. Favourite food: Pizza. Raggedy Doctor, fish fingers and custard, four psychiatrists... and...” she leaned in to whisper something in her other self's ear. The younger Amy recoiled slightly before listening for a second. Her eyes widened and a queasy look passed over her face, followed by a wry smile that, to the Doctor, seemed forced somehow.  
  
The Doctor and Rory exchanged glances as their Amy turned to them, blushing slightly. “Yep,” she said, “I think she's me.”  
  
The Doctor smiled, and Rory looked worried. “What was that?” he asked. “What did she tell you?”  
  
“Something personal,” his Amy replied.  
  
“About me?” he wanted to know.  
  
“Rory, look up 'personal' in the dictionary,” the Doctor put in, before adding, emphatically; “ _Jammy Dodgers_ .”  
  
Despite the Time Lord's admonishment, Amy answered her husband. “No,” she said, and noting Rory's sigh of relief, she added, teasingly; “Well... not directly, anyway.”  
  
As his expression changed, the future Amy spoke up. “Sorry Doctor... Rory... but me and I are going to have to love you and leave you for a while.”  
  
“We are?” her other self asked curiously.  
  
“Things to discuss. Nothing to worry about,” the older Amy replied.  
  
The Doctor eyed her cautiously. “Right you are,” he said warily. “Just remember,” he warned, “no one should know too much about their own future...”  
  
“Don't worry, I'll take a leaf out of River's diary,” the new Amy replied before clarifying her meaning. “Spoilers!”  
  
The Doctor gave her a distracted smile as she turned to her younger self. “Come on,” she said, taking her hand.  
  
“Where?” the 'present' Amy asked.  
  
“You'll see,” her older self answered as they descended the stairs and left the console room.  
  
Rory watched them go. “Doctor, are you sure we should...?”  
  
“Rory,” the Doctor cut him off, rolling his eyes and slapping the young man's shoulder, “I think we should leave these two lovebirds alone for a little while.”  
  
“Wait,” Rory said, his expression growing very serious, “they touched each other. Shouldn't there have been a spark, like with the screwdrivers in the Pandorica chamber?” He thought for a moment. “It didn't happen with Kazran either...”  
  
The Doctor sighed. “I'll explain later.”  
  
“But...” Rory began, but then a thought struck him. “... _These two lovebirds_ ”? he thought. _No, they're not..._ ? “Hold on, Doctor... _what_ did you say?!”


	2. Mirror/rorriM

“What are we doing?” Amy asked her older self as they traversed the labyrinthine corridors. She suspected that the woman had called her here alone to discuss her... _their_ secret.  
  
“Think about it,” the other her replied. “We've got just under an hour to kill. We're going to have some fun.”  
  
Amy recognised the look on her other self's face as one she had practised in the mirror many times. The same look she had given the Doctor upon attempting to seduce him after the _Byzantium_ incident. Suddenly, she caught on.  
  
“You're not _serious_?!” she said, her eyes widening.  
  
“Come on, I'm _you_. You're _me_. Haven't you ever wondered what it would be like?”  
  
“If you're me, then you know I was just discussing it with Rory.”  
  
“Well... yeah,” the older Amy conceded. “We're here, it's an opportunity. Trust me, it's going to be _good_.” She smiled wickedly.  
  
“It is?” Amy said warily.  
  
“Of _course_!” her slightly older self answered, as if it could be anything but. “I know what's going to happen, because I've done all this before. Three days ago, when I was you.”  
  
“Oh... right,” Amy realised, her heart pounding in her chest.

 “Yeah,” her time-displaced self said, “and I'm sorry; this is going to hurt a bit.”

 “What?” Amy replied, suddenly alarmed.

 With no further warning, the other her spun on her heels abruptly, took hold of her by the shoulders and slammed her hard against the corridor wall. Amy let out a yelp of pain, but before she could form a coherent sentence of protest, she felt her other self's hands lifting up her skirt and grasping her buttocks.

 She let out a cry of shocked incredulity. “Hey! Hands!!”

 “I'm _you_ ,” the other Amy reminded her as she grasped at the bare skin, left uncovered by the thong her younger self was wearing; the one that had driven Rory to distraction and started this whole mess in the first place.

 The younger Amy shivered as she bore the cold, clammy hands kneading her buttocks. “So,” she gasped, “is this technically incest or masturbation?”

Her other self smiled, leaned in close to herself, and said in the most sultry tone she could muster; “Think of the best wank you ever had and times it by fifty...”  
  
Amy caught her breath, as her other self continued. “And the best part is,” she licked her lips in anticipation, “you'll get to do it all over again in three days time!”  
  
“Well,” Amy said thoughtfully, her breath quickening, “when you put it like that...”  
  
“There you go!” The future her beamed. She ceased her welcome exploration of her younger self, leaving Amy breathless.

Amy adjusted her skirt, before her other self took her hand. “You're gonna  _love_ this.” The older her giggled like a schoolgirl, and proceeded to lead herself down the corridor.

“Wait,” Amy said, causing her older self to pause with exasperation, despite her knowing what was coming. “Have you talked to him yet?”  
  
Her other self deflated for a moment and placed a hand on her stomach. She hesitated before answering. “No. No, not yet.”  
  
As the younger Amy opened her mouth to speak, her older self cut her off, her smile returning. “Plenty of time for that! Come on.” She took her other self's hand again and led her through the hexagonal maze.  
  
“Where are we going?” Amy wanted to know.  
  
“You'll see,” her older self replied once again, teasingly. “This way,” she said, pausing as they came to a crossroads, where three corridors connected in a 'Y' shape, and a fourth – currently closed-off – extended downward in the middle like a bottomless shaft, for the TARDIS's corridors intersected not only horizontally, but vertically. Whenever one wanted to switch direction from one to the other, the gravitational field adjusted, causing a dizzying sensation as the vertical stretch of corridor appeared to become horizontal. In reality, it was merely a perceptual change in the ship's occupant, as they would appear to any observer to be stepping from one centre of gravity to another.  
  
Amy still couldn't get used to it. She wondered why the ship's architecture had to be arranged in such a way? _Because walking in a straight line is too boring_ , she considered with a roll of her eyes. _That's the Doctor all over_.  
  
Future Amy waved her hand over the door sensor, causing the floor corridor to open and admit them. They prepared themselves for the dizzying sensation and crossed into the other gravitational field. Eventually, they reached the swimming pool, no longer in the library since the TARDIS's regeneration. The pool, for reasons Amy had never quite been able to fathom, looked like an old brick-walled Victorian swimming bath. It was charming, she thought, in a retro sort of way. The only major difference of course, was that Victorian swimming baths didn't generally have large glass domes in their roofs that looked out into space. Amy didn't understand how it worked given that they were inside a Police Box, but it looked beautiful, with the reflection of the stars in the still water.  
  
Letting go of her own hand, the future Amy ran to the edge of the pool and spun around to address herself.  
  
“I know you're nervous,” she said, seriously. “Don't be.”  
  
Amy's shoulders lowered slightly. She felt marginally reassured. “But what if they hear us?” She asked. “Or worse, what if Rory comes in?”  
  
The future Amy smiled at her mischievously. “OK. One; they don't. Two; he doesn't, and Three; would that be so bad? Besides, you think they don't know what we're doing?”  
  
Amy's mouth opened involuntarily.  
  
“The Doctor's not stupid,” her older self reminded her.  
  
“You don't care?” Amy asked.  
  
“Why should we?” her other self replied.  
  
Amy's expression said; _g_ _ood point_. She fixed herself with a look of anticipation. “OK, so what happens now?”  
  
“Well, _me_ ,” the other Amy began, “or should I call you Amy 2?”  
  
Amy's eyes widened in mock indignation. “Hey, this is _my_ timeline, miss. _You're_ Amy ' _2_ '!”  
  
The future Amy smirked. “Right. Sorry. Amy _1_ , then. I guess that makes me Amy 2...”  
  
Amy '1' returned the same expression. “That's better.”  
  
Amy 2 poked her tongue at her younger self, playfully. “Well, 'Amy _1_ ', what happens now is... you're gonna take charge.”  
  
Amy 1 regarded her with a look of surprise. “Me?”  
  
“Yep,” her other self said. “Use your imagination. I'm yours.” She winked at herself again.  
  
Amy 1 gulped. “Um, OK...” She took a deep breath. Then her lips curled into a smile as she suddenly seemed to find her confidence. “Strip,” she commanded.  
  
“Direct, I like it,” Amy 2 replied, then proceeded to do as she was told.  
  
Amy 1 watched intently as her other self kicked off her trainers and began to remove her top slowly, making a show of it. “Thank you, Santa...” she muttered under her breath.  
  
Amy 2 smiled seductively as she unbuttoned her jeans and slowly and deliberately pulled down the zip between thumb and forefinger, giving her temporal doppelgänger a glimpse of the purple lace and satin thong she was wearing underneath which, as with the matching bra, Amy 1 had never seen before.  
  
“Are they new?” she asked.  
  
Amy 2 nodded, grinning. “Yep. You'll buy them yesterday... I mean... two days from now.” She looked momentarily perplexed. “God, these tenses are so confusing.”  
  
“Aw,” Amy 1 pouted playfully. “Did you buy them just for me?”  
  
Her future self grinned as she slid her skinny dark blue jeans down her shapely long legs. “Yep,” she replied as she pulled them off, taking her ankle socks with them. “Just for me.”

“That's... kind of sad,” Amy 1 remarked, returning the grin and looking herself up and down, taking in the sight as if seeing herself for the very first time. “God, I'm like a hundred feet tall!” she exclaimed.

“I know!” Amy 2, now clad in merely her underwear, replied. “Weird, isn't it.”  
  
Amy 1 nodded, a little unsure of herself now. This was _more_ than a little weird. _This_ was totally surreal. For a moment, she wondered whether she could go through with it.  
  
“Yes, you can,” Amy 2 stated, remembering exactly what she was thinking at this precise moment three days ago.  
  
Amy 1 breathed out slowly, giving herself a weak smile. “OK,” she said. “If we're gonna do it...” she trailed off, and the coquettish smirk returned to her face. “All the way,” she said, indicating with her finger her sudden desire to see a side of herself she had never explored... literally.  
  
Amy 2 reached behind her back and unhooked her bra, then removed the straps and let it fall to the floor.  
  
Amy 1 took a good, long look at her breasts, recognising them; firm and with her little nipples standing to attention, betraying her other self's arousal — arousal she herself shared. She had of course seen them in the mirror a million times, but seeing them staring back at her in the flesh was an entirely new experience. Still, she wanted to go further.  
  
She watched as her other self hooked her thumbs into the waistband of her sexy new knickers, and pulled them down to her knees before letting them fall the rest of the way to her ankles and stepping out of them. She stared open-mouthed at her own nude form standing before her, letting her eyes dart up and down her body from head to toe, and then taking a long slow look up her body from the toes up, taking in the sight of her long legs and up past her unexpectedly smooth, bare mound, past her stomach to her breasts and then back down to her crotch. Her eyes fixated there for several seconds.  
  
“Are you just gonna stare at my crack all day?” Amy 2 asked, seemingly bemused.  
  
Amy 1 shuddered. “ _Please_ don't call it that...”  
  
“Ah... right, yeah.” Amy 2 nodded sheepishly. “Sorry.”  
  
Amy 1 thought for a moment. “Hey... you know, it is mine too!”  
  
Amy 2 chuckled. “Good point.”  
  
Amy 1 smiled. “You've shaved,” she observed.

Her other self nodded “Fancied a change.” She winked at herself.

Amy 1 raised her eyebrows and smiled, understanding. She generally maintained a thin strip of pubic hair to please Rory, who disliked what he called “the little girl look,” despite she herself preferring the smooth feel of bare skin down there; while she had always loved her head of flowing naturally-copper hair, there was something about ginger pubes that she just didn't like. She much preferred the look and feel of a smooth mound. It would seem that within the next three days, in anticipation of this encounter, she would shave to her own preference. Unable to help herself, she reached out and touched her own mound, firstly with the tips of her fingers, then brushing her knuckles lightly over the smooth skin before running the tip of her fingernail down the other Amy's cleft.

“Mmm...” Amy 2 murmured, closing her eyes as her younger self reached her already swollen clitoris and began rubbing it the way she always did, knowing just how to apply the right friction and pressure. It was a strange sensation, doing it to 'someone else' — for all intents and purposes — and her other self clearly enjoyed it, murmuring and gasping with pleasure.  
  
Amy 1 smiled to herself with satisfaction. She stopped what she was doing and pulled her hand away, causing her future self to give a slight moan in protest. “Hey, you can't complain,” Amy 1 said matter-of-factly, “I'm you, you're me. I'm just doing exactly what you did three days ago.”  
  
“Yeah, and you're making me pay for it now...” Amy 2 moaned.  
  
“What? That doesn't make sense!” Amy 1 laughed.  
  
“You stopped wanking me,” Amy 2 stated in an accusatory tone, “I don't have to be logical!”  
  
Her other self grinned. “Since you're me,” she said, “you know exactly what I'm going to ask you to do next...”  
  
Amy 2's shoulders dropped slightly. “Yes,” she said wearily. She knew exactly what her other self wanted; to see herself from an angle she had never seen before. Yet despite having been the person standing before her now, mentally demanding this of her, she now found it faintly embarrassing. Sighing, she turned around slowly to face away from her other self and bent over slightly, before reaching behind her and clasping her hand on her buttocks. Purposefully, she pulled and spread them apart.  
  
Heat rose in her cheeks — the ones on the side of her face — as her embarrassment increased.  
  
“That is so weird,” she heard her other self say. “I mean... well, it's not something you see every day...”  
  
Amy 2 looked behind her to see her other self bending over and staring at her behind, just as she herself remembered doing three days ago. She rolled her eyes. “Yep,” she concurred, “and I've not even seen you naked yet!”  
  
“Yes you have!” Amy 1 pointed out.  
  
“You know what I mean,” Amy 2 replied, rolling her eyes again.  
  
“OK,” Amy 1 sighed. She removed her boots quickly without fuss or fanfare, and then set to work unbuttoning the red and white chequered shirt she was wearing, pausing to take off her watch while she thought of it, anticipating a dip in the pool at some point. When she finished, she unravelled the small scarf around her neck and dropped it to the floor before slowly and deliberately removing the shirt. She unrolled her sleeves to ease the process, and when finally out of the shirt she held out the garment at arm's length and, with a quick lift of her eyebrows to accompany her seductive pout, let it drop.  
  
Amy 2 watched, licking her lips in anticipation. She had to laugh at herself, getting off on watching herself undress. Her other self tugged at the hem of her short skirt, then lifted it up, momentarily giving her a glimpse of the unremarkable black lace thong she had slipped on three days ago, before quickly pulling down her tights.  
  
Once the tights were off, Amy gave herself a look that said; _Here we go_... and purposefully undid the thin leather belt holding her skirt in place, then unbuttoned it and pulled it down to just above her knees, and let it slide down her shapely legs, just as she had for Rory on more than one occasion.  
  
The skirt arrived at her feet, settling around her ankles. She stepped out of it and hooked her thumbs into the waistband of her thong. Pausing for just a moment to look herself in the eye, she noticed her other self give her a slight nod of encouragement. She pulled the elastic away from her skin, and gently tugged the thong down her legs before letting it fall as she had the skirt.  
  
They stood facing each other, both Ponds now as naked as the day she was born.  
  
Amy 2 moved closer and examined herself, looking deep into her eyes. She saw a combination of unadulterated lust — a by-product of pure narcissism — and nervous uncertainty. She reached out and stroked her other self's cheek, brushing a stray lock of deep red hair away from her face. Her other hand made its way along her arm. As one they peered at each other intently, noting their pale, lightly freckled skin, taking in every minute detail; the tiny hairs on their arms standing on end in response to the slightest touch.  
  
Amy 1 shivered slightly at the familiar sensation of her own hand brushing against her cheek, yet seemingly belonging to someone else. Together they ran their hands over each other's body, each Amy feeling her own soft skin, exploring the contours of her form — familiar and yet so alien — and drinking in the headily intoxicating scent of their shared arousal.  
  
Amy — both of her — closed her eyes as she ran her hands over her other self's breasts, cupping them and feeling her own nipples respond to her touch. Amy 1 opened her eyes, and jumped. Delayed shock, she reasoned. Although she had a moment ago been getting used to the situation, she had so begun to lose herself in the exhilarating thrill of the physical sensation that she had momentarily lost her conscious grip on what was happening. Upon opening her eyes, she had been shocked to see her own visage before her, equally dazed.  
  
She caught her breath, and denied the bizarre reality of what was happening, choosing instead to allow herself to be swept away as if in a dream.  
  
Without warning, Amy 2 leaned in close and began to plant small kisses on her own cheek, eliciting a series of small gasps from her other self. She avoided kissing herself on the lips for now, for she knew that at this point her other self wasn't quite ready for that yet; somehow, she remembered, that just seemed a little too weird.  
  
Instead, she concentrated on administering small butterfly kisses against her younger self's skin, moving down from her face to her neck and along her collarbone. Sinking to her knees, she then moved down her other self's body, running her hands and lips over her torso, paying special attention to her breasts and arriving at her stomach, where she ran her tongue around her belly button, and licked her way down to her mound. Drawing a deep breath and taking in the intoxicating scent of her own arousal, she parted the other Amy's labia and began to swirl her tongue in a circling motion over her swollen clit.  
  
Amy 1 gasped, her breathing then continuing to grow steadily heavier with each lick, flick and suck. She became aware of Amy 2 slipping her hand in between her folds, steadily massaging the soaking wet tender skin around her vagina, pausing only occasionally to pinch her clit between thumb and forefinger in the way she always liked. Amy's skin tingled, and she could feel her legs begin to tremble as an orgasm began to build inside her.  
  
Knowing what was coming — literally — the older Pond smiled to herself. She began to move her hand more rapidly, masturbating her with abandon.  
  
“You like that?” Amy 2 asked, rhetorically.  
  
Amy 1 could barely speak, but just managed to articulate her intense desire. “Oh yeah...” she said, her breathy voice simultaneously dreamy, sultry and seductive. “Make me come,” she begged.  
  
Amy 2 returned a lascivious smirk, filled with mischief. “My wish is my command...”  
  
She sped up again, and Amy 1 opened her eyes briefly, looking down to see her other self's hand moving so quickly that it was almost a blur, and the sight and sensation were enough to send her over the edge. The climax seemed to start in her scalp and toes and meet at the core of being. Her breathing grew heavy and she began to moan in ecstasy.  
  
The older Amy could feel the heat from her other self's pussy, and her hand was now soaked with her own moisture. Empathising with herself, as well as remembering the sensation from three days earlier, the older Amy began to feel it once again. Drawing her hand away and rising to her feet, she quickly helped herself along by masturbating furiously for a few seconds, catching up with her other self as she came and came.  
  
Amy 2 threw her arms around herself and held her tightly, her younger self returning the embrace as much for the physical support as any expression of self-loving. Throwing back her head, the present Amy cried out in beautiful agony as her legs gave way beneath her. Her older self managed to retain her balance despite her own orgasm, holding onto her for dear life as the feeling rippled through her body. For the older Amy, hearing her own shrill cries and gasps sent chills down her spine.  
  
The intense feeling lasted about fifteen seconds before beginning to subside, and the pair finally collapsed to their knees, quaking in each other's arms as the aftershock took hold. The sound of their heavy breathing filled the air, echoing around the chamber before an eerie calm descended upon the water, and one woman giggled to herself.  
  
Together they lay down on the tiled floor of the poolside, wrapped in each other's arms. Amy's flesh tingled as what felt like tiny electric shocks coursed through her body every few seconds and finally began to subside. Their bodies dripping with perspiration, their skin glistened in the low light.  
  
“That was a _hell_ of a thing...” the present Amy finally managed to say, the disbelief evident in her voice.  
  
“How do you feel?” her future self asked. She knew the answer of course, but her older self had asked that question three days ago, so she had to ask it now. Time paradoxes still gave her a headache.  
  
Amy 1 hesitated for a moment. “ I'm not sure what I'm supposed to think... You?”  
  
“I just licked out my own pussy,” her older self said simply as she stroked her hair gently, “it's a bit weird!”  
  
“And is that my cum-face?! I look like I'm trying not to sneeze!”  
  
Amy 2 smiled almost imperceptibly. Holding herself tightly in her arms, she felt her trembling form and noted her pale, languid appearance. She hadn't realised just how physically shocked she had been when she had lived through this the first time. “Maybe we should go and get the boys?” she suggested playfully.  
  
“Mmmmmm...” the younger Amy said approvingly, “a doppelgängbang?”  
  
“Think the Doctor would go for it?”  
  
Amy shook her head. “Nah. Two hearts, no dick,” she said dismissively.  
  
The older Amy chuckled at her own wit.  
  
“I can't believe this, I'm having a post-sex chat with myself,” Amy 1 said suddenly.  
  
“First sign of madness...” her older self said wryly. “We're not done yet, though.”  
  
Amy inclined her head toward herself. “We're not?”  
  
“Nope,” the older Amy replied. “Things are about to get a _lot_ more interesting.”


	3. Duality

Amy stood at the edge of the pool, staring at her reflection in the water. The distorted image provided an apt metaphor for what she was now feeling. Behind her, her other self lay on her back, supporting herself on her elbows, watching her.  
  
“I know you're looking at my arse,” said the Amy who was standing by the pool, without looking around.  
  
“You betcha,” her younger self replied flirtatiously as she admired her own posterior. “I'm never gonna get used to that. I don't wanna sound up myself or anything but that is _fine_.”  
  
 _Up myself_ , she thought, suddenly getting an idea. She opened her mouth to voice it, but her older self spoke first.  
  
“Yeah, we're gonna do that, just wait...”  
  
Amy's eyebrows raised almost involuntarily. “O...K...” she stammered.  
  
The older Amy smirked at her. “Too bad I didn't think to nick the sonic screwdriver before I came here,” she said. “Just think of the fun we could've had with that.”  
  
“Oh, he totally got it from some alien version of Ann Summers,” the present Amy replied. “Not to mention how the thing in that glass column in the middle of the control console looks like a giant butt plug. We might think he's like a little parish boy when it comes to sex but he's blatantly _obsessed_!”  
  
Her other self grinned, then put her hands together in a praying gesture and steeled herself before diving into the pool. She hit the water hard, finding it to be a pleasing lukewarm temperature. Submerging, she swam down and back up in a perfect arc to find herself above the water once again. She let out the breath she'd been holding in as soon as she broke the surface, and wiped water from her eyes before opening them to find the other her now sitting on the edge of the pool, dangling her legs over the side.  
  
“Coming in?” she asked, knowing the answer.  
  
The younger Amy kicked her legs in the water causing tiny splashes, the way she had as a child when Aunt Sharon used to take her to feed the ducks in Leadworth — until Aunt Sharon would tell her off and order her to get out of the duck pond. “What have you got in mind?”  
  
“What you've got in mind, of course,” she answered immediately.  
  
Amy 1's lips curled into a smile. Supporting herself with her arms, she dropped from her sitting position down into the pool and swam front crawl over to her other self. She gave herself a half-smile as the whole weird, bizarre enormity of what they had done and were about to do sank in.  
  
“So,” she said nervously, “are we actually gonna kiss then?”  
  
“That would be a bit weird wouldn't it?” the older Amy said playfully.  
  
“Kind of...” her younger self conceded.  
  
Saying nothing more, Amy 2 waded closer to herself and wrapped her arms around her, gazing longingly into her own eyes.  
  
 _This is mental_ , Amy 1 thought.  
  
“Tell me about it,” Amy 2 replied, and she leaned in and brushed her lips softly against her own.  
  
It was the strangest sensation. It wasn't like kissing Rory, or any other man, but rather more tender. The kiss lasted just a few moments before Amy broke it off and pulled away from her future self.  
  
“That's just too weird,” she said. “But then, you knew that.”  
  
The future Amy nodded, smilingly. “Yeah, I knew that. Funny how you can shag yourself but kissing just seems too weird.” She emphasised her double's last two words, making them seem faintly ridiculous.  
  
“Well, I'm good for the other thing?” the younger Amy replied, propositioning herself.  
  
Her older self arched her right eyebrow, the hint of a small lustful smile playing across her face... but her eyes didn't smile. “Yeah, I'm good for that too,” she replied, suddenly with an apparent hint of nervousness in her voice. “But I know what's coming...”  
  
“What do you mean?” The youngest Amy asked as she looked at her older self for a long while, taking in every detail of her own face, her own body. It was so strange, even after doing this all before three days ago from her temporal doppelgänger's perspective, to be looking into her own eyes like this. She considered how far she had come since joining the Doctor on his travels; she had once felt so lost, but now she had found herself again.  
  
The universe had turned against her. Her entire life had been turned upside-down by the universe deciding to play a practical joke on her; her parents had been stolen — ripped out of time and space by a crack in the skin of reality. Her mind had rebelled, unable to remember them. She had remembered bits and pieces, like her mum carving smiley faces in apples to get her to eat them — fragments of disjointed images that didn't make sense, yet somehow seemed perfectly natural.  
  
The Doctor had put things right.  
  
He had restored the universe, and with it her life. Her parents had been returned to her, alive and well, as if nothing had happened; the fourteen years she had lived without them erased and replaced by the life she should have had all along. No longer had she felt so abandoned and so alone. No longer was Rory the one friend she had clung to in her lonely and frightening existence — someone to merely settle for — but someone she genuinely loved because he had brought excitement and happiness to her life, had shared her love of play and adventure. Yes, she had still been taken to four psychiatrists to talk about her strange delusion of a visit from the Raggedy Doctor who had mysteriously dropped out of the sky in his big blue box, and still she had bitten each one of them in turn when they had dared to suggest that he hadn't been real. This time, however, she had been surrounded by a loving family who had helped her through the painful time.  
  
Now she remembered both lives. That old, lonely, life... that frightened little girl, all alone in the big empty house with too many rooms... It was still there, nestling in some tiny, dark corner of her mind. She hated what it had done to her. She looked back on that scarred, insecure, frightened young woman, so guarded and quick to lash out. So afraid to let anyone in. So afraid to love. The woman who had thrown herself at the Doctor on the night before her wedding to Rory...  
  
Poor, lovely Rory. The man who had waited for her for 2,000 years, who had proven his love for her immeasurably. God knows why he had so loved that version of her, for she had used him shamelessly, disregarding his feelings in favour of her own selfish drives.  
  
She looked back at that woman now, and she hated her.  
  
When she looked at her other self now, all she could think was; _you bitch_.  
  
“There you go,” the older Amy said, knowing her other self's mind.  
  
“Ah...” Amy replied, suddenly understanding.  
  
The other Amy nodded. “I know what you're thinking,” she said, truly serious for the first time since her arrival in this time frame. “I know what you feel, because I felt it too. You think we deserve to be punished.”  
  
“Don't I?” she replied, refraining from using the pronoun “we.”  
  
“That's for you to answer,” the elder Amy replied.  
  
“But you _are_ me?!” her younger self protested.  
  
Amy 2 smiled, and this time, her whole face did so. “Yeah, but I've already made my decision on that score. You have to go your own way. Three days time, for you, you'll be where I am now, having this same conversation. Right now, you've got an opportunity to really explore yourself...” She spoke earnestly, her voice low. “That's what's important; right now.”  
  
Amy 1's mouth opened and closed. She didn't quite understand what her older self was getting at, but she had a vague idea. She held her own gaze for several seconds, before taking a deep breath and finding her voice. “OK,” she said. “Get out.”  
  
Amy 2 sighed. “Here we go...” she said under her breath. With that, she swam across to the edge of the pool, placed her hands on the poolside for support and pushed herself upwards against it, easing herself out.  
  
Amy 1 watched her as she hugged herself, shivering against the coolness of the room, which contrasted with the warm temperature of the water. “Are you OK?” she asked.  
  
Her older self looked at her with an expression of... fear. She nodded. “Yeah... it's just that I know what's coming. I know what you're about to do to me... because I did it to me.”  
  
Amy shivered, and not because of the cold. “What do you mean? What am I going to do?”  
  
The other her sighed. “You'll do what comes naturally. What you think you... I,” she corrected herself, “need.”  
  
She nodded, and thought of Rory, of his poor heart... of what it undoubtedly did to him to learn that she had thrown herself at the Doctor on the night before their wedding. She was out of her head though, wasn't she? She'd been whisked away by a strange man on the night before her wedding, had travelled through time and space and met Daleks, Weeping Angels and all sorts of nasty creatures. She'd been confused, upset and overwhelmed after her experience on the Byzantium. She had nearly died. She had been alone in the dark, and she had nearly died. She hadn't known what she was doing.  
  
But that was no excuse.  
  
Determinately she swam to the edge of the pool to join her other self. Rather than climb out as the other her had done, she decided to use the steps. Holding onto the railings either side of them, she stepped up out of the pool and stood opposite herself, a few feet away from her, like two enemies in a Western, sizing each other up before a shoot-out.  
  
Then, without breaking her gaze the older Amy got down on her knees, as if in supplication, before finally placing her hands on the tiled floor in front of her and going down on all fours, like a dog.  
  
Without saying a word, Amy walked towards her, and stopped just in front of her face. She reached down, cupped her other self's chin in her palm, and stared into her eyes. She looked into her own soul, seeing the frightened little girl she had once been, frightened of the woman she had become. She thought again of Rory, and of the Doctor, struggling to get away from her as she threw herself at him...  
  
“ _You're getting_ married _in the morning!” He cried incredulously as he leapt off her bed and backed against the TARDIS.  
  
“Well, the morning's a long time away,” she replied, following him up and pinning him against the Police Box. “What are we gonna do about that?”  
  
“Amy, listen to me; I am 907 years old. Do you understand what that means?” He struggled from her grip and moved away, forcing her to spin around in order to grab hold of him.  
  
“It's been a while?”  
  
“Ye — no. I'm 907 and look at me; I don't get older, I just change. You get older, I don't, and this Can't. Ever. Work!” He struggled from her grip once again and backed against his ship, seemingly for emotional support._  
  
Bless him. _She pouted at him, with a hint of pity as if he were an inexperienced teenager. “Aww, you are sweet, Doctor, but I really wasn't suggesting anything quite so... long term.” She had him. Clasping her hands around the nape of his neck, she kissed him passionately.  
  
For a few moments, he appeared to reciprocate, before coming to his senses and pushing her away. She looked at him, a look of shock on her face. She had been a kiss-o-gram, she was used to guys falling at her feet. No one had ever rejected her like this before.  
  
“But you're _human _, you're Amy, you're getting married in the morning...!”  
  
Jeez, it's just sex_, she had thought at the time. _We all do it. Like it's that big a deal!_  
  
That line of thought now appalled her. She considered that had their roles been reversed, and her actions had been perpetrated by the Doctor, trying to get her into bed like that, society would likely have viewed it as tantamount to attempted rape. When she thought of Rory, who had no doubt been drunkenly enjoying his stag do, safe in the knowledge that his fiancé was at home looking forward to their wedding day — to proclaiming her love for him — she felt ashamed. Her eyes filled with tears.  
  
Those same eyes stared back at her, pleading for forgiveness. Amy held her own gaze for a moment, then felt a surge of adrenaline course through her body. Without warning — though of course no warning was needed — her right arm swung through the air, almost of its own accord, and with every ounce of physical and emotional strength in her being, she slapped herself in the face. Hard.  
  
Her other self looked stunned, despite having known what was coming, even if her younger self hadn't. The sound of the slap echoed around the chamber as the future Amy stumbled for a moment, her head jolting to her right, and she froze for several seconds that seemed to last forever, before finally holding her right hand to her stinging cheek.  
  
Amy 1 opened her mouth to speak, but found herself unable to form words.  
  
The uncomfortable silence seemed to stretch on for at least a minute before Amy 2 finally looked at herself and spoke. “Wow, that felt even more painful than it looked.”  
  
“I'm sorry,” Amy 1 eventually managed to say. She didn't know what had possessed her.  
  
Amy 2 held her gaze. “It's OK,” she assured herself. “I know why you did it. I'm you, remember.” She stiffened her posture, sitting up straight yet remaining on her knees, and hesitated before continuing. “That was just the beginning. Now you're really going to go to town.”  
  
“I am?” Amy 1 asked with a mixture of fear and intrigue.  
  
Her other self nodded. “You know why. I know why. You think you're a slut who deserves to be punished, even though that's not who we are any more, but you need to do what you need to do.” Her face seemed to fall to the floor, and she spoke with extreme discomfort. “Just get it over with.”  
  
“If you've known what was going to happen from the start,” Amy 1 asked, “then why were you so excited? Why did you even come back here in the first place?”  
  
“Because I had to come back here,” Amy 2 answered without missing a beat. “You needed me here.”  
  
Amy 1 thought for a moment, then nodded.  
  
“Besides,” Amy 2 continued, “you heard what the Doctor said; we need to maintain the timeline. I had to come back here because it had already happened. I made sure I came back here.”  
  
Amy 1 narrowed her eyes. “What do you mean?” she asked.  
  
Amy 2 hesitated for a moment. “I mean I made sure the TARDIS crashed into itself.”  
  
Amy 1's jaw dropped. “You... _I_ did that?!”  
  
“You had to,” her future self replied. “If I hadn't, then the timeline could've collapsed.” She held her own gaze, looking faintly embarrassed. “Let's just say I wouldn't have passed my TARDIS driving test.”  
  
Suddenly, Amy 1 understood. She knew exactly what she would do in three days' time. “You got the Doctor to give you a driving lesson didn't you.”  
  
Amy 2 nodded. “Like I said, he never let's me have a go. Rory was right though; he probably shouldn't let me do it again.”  
  
Amy 1 rolled her eyes. “Let me guess,” she said in a mocking tone, “there was an 'unexpected TARDIS'?”  
  
“I knew it would work,” Amy 2 went on, ignoring her younger self's attempt at levity, “because it already had. All things considered though, I thought I did a pretty good job in getting where I had to go.”  
  
Again, Amy 1 understood immediately. “So that's why the TARDIS crashed into itself right after the space/time loop...”  
  
Amy 2 nodded. “Yep. I needed to be here, now, for you. It's still weird, isn't it,” she said. “The change in time, I mean. When the cracks closed everything went back to how it should be, but we were at the eye of the storm. We remember the way things were, too...” She looked at the floor, sadly. “The way I was.”  
  
It felt as if a knife were being pushed though her heart, but Amy couldn't feel sorry for herself. She was guilty; guilty of every single thing she blamed herself for.  
  
Without saying another word, she walked around behind her other self, who visibly tensed with the foreknowledge of what was coming, and returned to her position on all fours. Doggy style, Amy 1 now realised.  
  
Amy 1 knew what she was going to do, and not even the thought that she herself would have to be subjected to this in three days' time would be enough to make her hold back. After all, she deserved it.  
  
She knelt down behind her other self, slightly to the left of her, her posture erect. Still shivering from the contrast between the warm water and the cold air, she reached out instinctively and caressed her other self's right buttock, squeezing and kneading it before pulling her arm away and drawing it back.  
  
Amy 2 winced as she steeled herself.  
  
Amy 1 swung her arm down, and smacked her own backside as hard as she possibly could, causing her other self to draw a sharp intake of breath and let out a tiny squeak of pain. Without waiting for a response, she drew back her hand again and repeated the action.  
  
“Oh shi-”, her other self spat out in pain before being interrupted by another hard smack. Then another. Then another. Amy continued to spank herself repeatedly, each cheek in turn, letting no sense of empathy or sorrow cloud her feelings of anger and self-hatred. She was almost unaware of what she was doing, and only in time did she begin to realise that she had lost much of the feeling in her hand. Still in a daze, she spotted her thin brown leather belt discarded on the poolside floor. Leaving her wounded other self for a moment, she wandered over to it and picked it up before returning and putting it to use.  
  
Amy 2 winced and yelped as the onslaught continued, this time with the belt. Tears had begun to form in her eyes, but she refused to let them fall as the pain increased with each hit. It was nothing compared with what was going to happen next. She barely remembered what was happening from the perspective of being her other self, for it had felt as if she were slipping into a trance. Only when her older self — her now — had cried out for mercy had she finally snapped out of it. That time was now approaching rapidly.  
  
“Aaagh!” she cried out as the final hit connected with her raw skin, remembering how her arse had looked to her other self — bright red and glowing from the whipping. As her other self pulled back her arm once more, her hand clutching the belt tightly, she drew in a sharp intake of breath, causing the other her to stop what she was doing and drop the belt.  
  
Looking around — anywhere but at the woman quivering at her feet — she spotted a large pole, about six feet long, propped up against the wall. It was divided into two sections, with one obviously designed to retract into the other. At the end of it was a retractable head, apparently designed to be fitted with a leaf skimmer — though what the Doctor would need a leaf skimmer for in an indoor pool was anybody's guess. She went over to it and took it in her hands. She twisted it at the middle, and retracted the front part of the pole into the other section, lessening its length by half.  
  
She made her way back to where her other self was still shaking, fighting back tears. Walking around behind her, she dropped to her knees once again, and aimed the three-foot pole horizontally at her backside. The end of the pole was just a few inches in diameter — small enough to fit where she wanted it to go.  
  
Amy 2 braced herself, knowing what was coming, as her other self placed the end of the pole between her buttocks. Instinctively, she clenched her cheeks, not wishing to allow the assault, but as her other self found her hole and pushed forward she found herself unable to keep from letting go and relaxing her muscles. If relaxing was the right word.  
  
It was painful. Without any form of lubrication, it was painful. Still, Amy 1 pushed further, deepening her assault, pumping the pole in and out as far as it would go despite encountering resistance. Despite the lack of any lube, her hole began to open, eventually reaching its widest point. After about ten seconds, Amy 2 cried out in pain, tears now streaming down her face; “Stop! No more. _Please_ , no more!”  
  
Amy 1 stopped in her tracks and froze, rooted to the spot. A look of shock and abject horror registered across her face. Slowly, her hands shaking, she pulled out the pole and dropped it. She rose to her feet and stood, shaking from head to toe, and in that instant, she felt contemptible, degraded, ignoble, and despite the presence of her other self — shivering and shaken — she felt entirely _alone_.  
  
Amy 2's arms and legs gave way beneath her, and she collapsed to the floor, shivering and crying. Amy 1 remained frozen, contemplating what had just taken place, before she too collapsed to her knees once more, this time involuntarily. “I'm sorry,” she whispered, her voice breaking.  
  
Her other self sobbed uncontrollably, devoid of all her usual bravado and apparent confidence — no matter how affected that confidence usually was. Amy 1, without thinking about it, scooped up her other self in her arms and held her tightly. She was surprised to find her other self return the embrace, and they held each other for several minutes, Amy 1 stroking her other self's dripping wet hair.  
  
“I'm sorry,” she said again finally, breaking the silence.  
  
Amy 2 nodded. “I know,” she sniffed, then added, “I bet our psychiatrists would have a field day with this.”  
  
Amy 1 forced a slight chuckle. “They should've probably teamed up for this one.”  
  
Amy 2 forced a smile. Another couple of minutes went by, before she spoke again. “I've still got about fifteen minutes before the TARDISes separate and I vanish back to my own time.” She wiped away her tears and sniffed.  
  
Amy 1 nodded. “Better dry off and get dressed before you do, then.”  
  
Amy 2 shook her head. “There's still time. You're not quite finished yet.”  
  
Amy 1 regarded her sceptically. “I'm not? After that?”  
  
Amy 2 allowed the hint of a mischievous smile — albeit slightly forced — to play across her features. “Well...” she began, “you do have a lot to make up to me.”  
  
Amy 1 understood. “I see,” she said playfully, relieved that her other self wasn't fighting back. Clearly she didn't hate herself too much.  
  
Amy 2 smiled back, and Amy 1 shifted her position to sit back against the wall with her legs wide apart. Then, she beckoned her other self to sit between her legs by patting the floor. Knowing exactly what she wanted, Amy 2 sat between Amy 1's legs, facing away from her, and leaned back, resting her head against her other self's shoulder.  
  
Amy 1 slowly began to caress her other self's soft, tender skin, running her hands over her body, lightly. Amy 2 closed her eyes and murmured with pleasure at the sensation. She giggled as Amy 1 ran her hands over her breasts, squeezing them together and tweaking her nipples. She then felt the hands drift down towards her stomach, playing lightly over her tummy and swirling her middle finger around her navel. Without opening her eyes, she inclined her head upwards to plant a small kiss against her other self's cheek. Amy 1 returned it in kind, and continued to plant small loving kisses across her cheek and down along her neck to her collarbone, while her hands continued to sweep over her body, alighting nerve endings effortlessly and causing the tiny hairs on her arms and the back of her neck to stand on end.  
  
Eventually, those hands moved further south. Amy 1 began to caress the skin of her other self's mound, running her middle finger down along her cleft until she reached her folds. She then started to manipulate the skin of her vulva; swirling her hand in a circling motion, parting her labia and touching her throbbing clit with the tip of her finger before moving it away, teasingly. As she felt what was happening to her now, Amy 2 remembered what she had felt three days ago; a part of her wasn't sure any more which one of them was which. It hardly mattered though, for they were of one mind and intent.  
  
Her breathing grew heavier as the sensation increased in intensity, and she bucked her hips as her other self continued to stroke and caress her vulva with her right hand, while her left hand did the same to her left breast.  
  
Amy 1 pulled her right hand away — causing her other self to moan with displeasure — and brought it to Amy 2's mouth. Amy 2 took a deep breath, taking in her own scent on the tip of her other self's fingers, and without opening her eyes she opened her mouth and allowed her other self to put her fingers inside. She suckled away contentedly, tasting herself.  
  
Moving her hand back to her doppelgänger's sex, Amy 1 proceeded to massage her clit rapidly. As Amy 2 began to moan and whimper, and her breathing grew heavier, Amy 1 began to feel the sensation along with her, helped along in no small part by the fact of her other self writhing against her. She wrapped her legs around her other self tightly, peering over her shoulder to see her gasping, soaked pussy glistening in the low light.  
  
Perspiration dripped from them as they embraced each other, Amy 1 now pumping two fingers into her other self. Amy 2 gasped and moaned in agonising ecstasy. She was close.  
  
As her intense orgasm approached, she allowed the sensation to course throughout her body, over and around her. She cried out, her eyes screwed shut, her voiced pained. All too quickly the cry became a breath, and finally she panted in a series of short, sharp breaths until the feeling overtook her completely. Then she screamed.  
  
Once again, Amy 1 came along with her. This feeling was less intense than her doppelgänger's climax, but no less thrilling. She held her other self tightly as they came and came together, both whole bodies quaking spasmodically in each other's arms for about half a minute before the feeling subsided.  
  
Then, it was all over. Amy 2 chuckled as her lips curled into a look of sheer contentment. Once more she inclined her head and planted a kiss on her other self's cheek, and this time the other Amy reciprocated by meeting her lips with hers.  
  
They lay entwined for several minutes as the aftershocks subsided, stroking each other's still-wet hair.  
  
Finally, Amy 2 spoke. “I have to go,” she said reluctantly, sounding like a child who didn't want to get up in the morning.  
  
Amy 1 nodded. “You'd better dry off and get dressed,” she said softly.  
  
Amy 2 nodded and, with difficulty, rose to her feet, struggling against her fatigue. There were clean towels in a closet adjacent to the pool, they knew, and together they fetched one each and dried themselves off before gathering their clothes and beginning to dress.  
  
As they did so, Amy 1 spoke, a thought occurring to her. “Hey, I've just realised that Rory never got to get in on the action.” Her voice carried a hint of guilt and regret.  
  
“No. Shame,” Amy 2 replied as she fastened the top button of her jeans and did up the zip, “but hey, maybe another time...” She smiled at herself mischievously.  
  
Amy 1 returned it, and raised her eyebrows. “I guess I'll just have to make sure I don't get any better at driving,” she said, smirking flirtatiously.  
  
“Mmm,” her future self murmured in agreement. Then, her expression growing more serious, she asked; “Feeling any better about yourself?”  
  
Amy 1 thought for a moment. “Yeah,” she replied. “I guess I just needed to...” she trailed off as she considered exactly what it was she had needed to do.  
  
“Deal with a few issues,” her other self finished for her.  
  
“Yeah,” the present Amy agreed. “I kind of know who I am now.” She smiled to herself, genuinely, realising the truth of her statement. Paradoxically she had, through such profoundly adult actions, found a degree of catharsis and achieved a state of childlike innocence that she had not felt in a long time.  
  
Her future self, now fully dressed once again, smiled back. Knowing what was about to happen, she braced herself for the temporal displacement. “Well, I'm off,” she said. “It was nice to meet me!” Then she added; “And to do me...”  
  
“Brings a whole new meaning to 'go fuck yourself', doesn't it.”  
  
The future Amy grinned broadly.  
  
Amy sighed. “Well, I'll see me in three days!” She watched in faint surprise as her future self began to fade, becoming translucent.  
  
As she disappeared, Amy heard her own voice calling back to her, echoing; “Don't forget to go underwear shopping!”  
  
The voice seemed to sail away on the wind as the future her vanished completely, leaving Amy alone with her thoughts. She stood for a while, watching the spot where her future self had disappeared, then turned and slowly made her way to Rory's and her room — complete with its marital bunk beds — where she intended to shower before returning to the control room. Her thoughts dwelt on the experience that she had just shared with herself, and it occurred to her that in three days' time she would of course have to go through everything again from the opposite perspective, something she didn't immediately relish. Still, she thought, her time-hopping had served a purpose; For the first time in many years, she felt like Amelia Pond again, and she now felt as if she could finally put that other life — that other _her_ — to bed.  
  
She walked with a spring in her step, smiling to herself.

 


End file.
